Are you trying to do everything perfectly?

Are you trying to do everything by the book?

If so, how long do you think it will last for?

This is the problem when people go ‘all or nothing’, they set a goal, make a plan, restrict themselves from the foods they like, start training every day of the week and prevent themselves from going out and socialising at every event. Is this realistic? Agreed, there is a time and a place for it, but it’s certainly not sustainable.

How about we start making small changes to our current lifestyle?

How about instead of changing everything we eat, restricting ourselves from the foods we enjoy. We start tracking 80% of our nutritional intake and still consume 20% of the foods we enjoy?

How about instead of training 5-6 times per week, we start training 3 times per week and just start being more active daily, start walking more, taking the stairs, park a little further away from work? All of this will accumulate to so much more calorie expenditure than maximum effort in the gym 5-6 days per week, which often results in sitting on your backside doing nothing because you’re so tired.

How about when it’s a friend’s birthday, an event at work, family commitments that requires our attention; often more deservedly than ‘the gym’… What are you going to do then? These things happen and we shouldn’t feel the need to restrict ourselves from any of it.

Eating healthy and doing some form of training or exercise should not consume us, nor do we need to be going ‘all in’ 100%. This is not realistic, nor is it enjoyable, and it’s certainly not flexible.

Look at your current goals, start by making a small change to your current lifestyle, if you can still see yourself doing that in 6, 12, 18 MONTHS time great. Once you are consistently achieving that change, make another one, and repeat.

Remember; adherence to a plan is the number one most important factor to consider when looking to achieve any goal. If you can’t stick to it then it’s not “optimal” for you.